For eighty-nine days, Dominic Vale had been a ghost tangled in medical wiring. Now, his hand—heavy, calloused, and radiating dangerous heat—was locked around my wrist with a terrifying, vice-like strength. The monitors were no longer beeping in their predictable, soothing cadence; they were screaming a frantic, high-pitched symphony of chaos.

Julian’s face twisted in sheer disbelief. He stared at Dominic—at the blood soaking his shirt, the pale skin, the lethal focus in his eyes.

“You... you should be dead,” Julian stammered, his fingers tightening on the trigger of his assault rifle. “The doctor injected enough paralytic into your IV to stop a horse!”

“Turns out,” Dominic replied, his voice a low, terrifying whisper as he stepped closer, “I’m very hard to kill. Especially when someone is waiting for me to stay.”

He glanced sideways at me for a fraction of a second, a silent acknowledgment passing between us that made my chest tighten in a way I couldn't explain.

“Drop the weapon, Julian,” Dominic commanded. “The port is locked. Your mercenaries have surrendered, and the federal task force is pulling into the harbor right now. It’s checkmate.”

Julian’s eyes darted frantically toward the control panel. With a maniacal yell, he lunged toward the master detonation trigger on the console, his finger slamming down onto the red button.

“If I don’t own the empire, nobody does!” Julian shrieked.

I reacted on pure instinct. I threw my entire body across the console, slamming my hand down on the emergency override switch just as Julian’s finger hit the detonator.

BZZZZT!

The master circuit fried in a shower of blue sparks. The blinking red lights on the fuel tanks outside stopped dead.

The explosives were disabled.

Before Julian could recover, Dominic closed the distance between them with terrifying speed. The butt of his titanium pistol crashed heavily against Julian’s jaw.